Former Minister backs Lubicon

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A settlement of the 50-year-old Lubicon land claim should include the hotly disputed compensation package that has dead-locked current negotiations, a former Conservative cabinet member says.

"Any settlement has to take into account the facts of the treatment to which the Lubicon have been exposed," said E. Davie Fulton, who write a mid-80s government report on the Lubicon for then Indian Affairs Minister John Crombie.

"I'm dreadfully sorry about this instance. I hope it's the only one in the history

of our country and that it will be settled soon and that there will never be another one."

In a presentation to the Lubicon Settlement Commission, a review group studying the current Lubicon claim proposals, Fulton said the northern Alberta band has been denied the benefits of a land settlement due to government wrangling.

Many of the Lubicon compensation issues, like loss of livelihood from oil and gas development, would not have arisen if Ottawa and Alberta had followed through on a 1940 promise to settle with the band, he said.

Current negotiations are bogged down over Lubicon demands for a $100 million compensation fund in addition to Ottawa's current $73 million offer, which includes the estimated value of the reserve land.

Fulton was federal justice minister from 1957 to 1963. He was a Conservative member of Parliament for almost 20 years and he served on the British Columbia Supreme Court for eight years. In 1985 he was commissioned by Ottawa to conduct an inquiry into the Lubicon dispute. His report was held back by the government when he came out in favor of the Lubicon position.

After arguing in favor of compensation at the Edmonton hearings last week, Fulton also cautiously endorsed the Lubicon's $100 million request.

"It's dangerous, I think, to speculate," he said. "I've heard mentioned the figure in the area of $100 million. I do not think that would be a great exaggeration of the claim. It might be generous, but I do not think it would be unreasonable."

Fulton also said it was his impression that Ottawa unrealistically feared the Lubicon compensation proposal would set a precedent.

The Lubicon situation is unique, he said, because the promise of a settlement has gone unfulfilled for so long.

"I can't help wondering whether one of the obstacles to progress has not been fear of creating a precedent. My answer to that was I can't see this being a precedent because this is an entirely unique set of circumstances.

"A band was promised, over 50 years ago, a settlement and a reserve that would have given them a livelihood, set them up in that way so that they wouldn't have suffered so dreadfully from the loss of their other form of livelihood and would have had other benefits allow from it."